What other industries connect to your career choice?
Law, CPA, Financial, Construction, Government Affairs, Non Profit, Homelessness, Architectural, Planning, Housing, Business, Economics, Banking.
Describe the future skill sets essential for future business leaders and innovators.
Oral communication skills. Now, and more so in the future, our leaders will have to convey orally to a much wider and diverse audience their values and visions to motivate and inspire people. The internet is creating a generation of persons who maybe “linked in,” but they are also disconnected. With so much information available to the public at the click of a mouse, our future leaders will need to share their visions orally if they hope to make connections with people and motivate them to action.
Define innovation methods you apply to your business and life.
As a commercial real estate professional, I offer clients advice and guidance designed to help them save time and make them more money. I am a conduit through which landlords and tenants find mutual ground upon which to consummate their desires to advance their mutually exclusive financial goals. To assist in the achievement of this goal, I use video, streamed across the internet, to convey the benefits of my client’s space to tenants who watch the video from the comfort of their office. Click here to see the hottest retail space in Washington, DC.
Describe goal setting methods you use and how you evaluate your success?
Financial goal setting is done on an annual basis. In February, I review with my accountability coach my past performance over the previous year to help inform and set the proper expectations for the coming year. Once the financial goal is determined, I set forth the quarterly, monthly, weekly, daily and hourly financially objectives I must achieve in order to meet my annual goal. This is only part of the formula. Next, I develop a lead generation strategy. Here, I define the specific type of clients I will prospect for and the total number of clients I need to contact to insure that I meet my financial goals. With the help of an accountability coach, I am able to know both how much revenue is needed from the number of leads I need to contact every day, week, month to meet my annual income goals.
Who do you consider your peers in you field and a few that are great examples you can get support and best practices?
Kenneth Brewer, Sr, Executive Director HSCDC.
Pat Long, Team Leader, Keller Williams Preferred properties.
Byron Smith, Sr, Principal Metropolitan Realty Group
Herman Bulls, International Director and Chairman, Public Institutions, Jones Lang LaSalle
Howard Ways, Executive Director, Redevelopment Authority of Prince Georges County, MD
Ernest Jarvis, SVP, First Potomac Realty
Dawn Marcus, Communications manager, Hines.
Kevin Howard, SVP CBRE.
Name your favorite role models for success in two industries?
Les Brown, Speaking
Don Peebles, Real Estate
Names three books that changed how you saw life and you recommend to others?
Millionaire Real Estate Agent (MREA) by Gary Keller
It’s Your Time by Joel Osteen
Talent is Overrated by Geoffrey Colvin
Explain why lifelong learning is important to you.
It is sometimes said that life is like a game, play hard and live well. If life is like a game, then learning is like the score clock, once you stop learning…game over. The more I have learned in every endeavor of my life, the more I have come to see just how little I know and just how much more there is to learn. Take for example my two children, Aliza (15) and Absalom (12). The more I learn and the more I share with them, the more I see just how farther in this life they will travel than me.
Describe the voice of success you hear in your head.
The voice of success in my head reminds me to do the best I can with what I have. It’s a coaching voice that reminds me that no matter how bad it appears to my eyes trust in the Lord and this too will pass. It’s a voice of courage that reminds me to never fear the unknown. And it’s the voice of reason that reminds me to have faith in the goodness and honor of others and to trust that when others seek their interest they are not always seeking to harm my interest.
Community success based on what you do in the community means what to you?
Back when I was a much younger man attending the University of Virginia, I was confronted with this very issue of community, the black community. Being a part of a minority community at a majority white institution I faced the question of what can I do to help my race, my community, black people. I struggled with the matter and spoke with several people seeking their counsel and advice.
One day, I met a former UVA football player who had graduated a few years earlier and was working on Wall Street as an investment banker. He was black and when I shared with him my issue, this was the advice he gave me. “Anthony, do you want to help your community, the black race? Graduate from the University of Virginia with a degree, go home and start your career, get married and have children and raise them to be good citizens. Do that, and you will have helped our community.”
I followed that advice and worked hard to achieve success for me and my family. And I have, we have the nice house in the nice neighborhood with the nice car and nice life. I am living my dream.
I am not sure when it happened, probably shortly after Aliza was born I began viewing my personal success and the community’s success differently. It was becoming clearer to me that just because I was achieving success did not mean that my community was also achieving success. I needed to give back to my community and use the gifts that I have been given to support and create success in my community.
Today I volunteer my time and resources on several boards of directors of non-profit organizations with missions to help improve the lives of the residents in Ward 7 in far northeast/south east DC.
One such group is ACHIEVE Kids Tri, Inc. ACHIEVE provides youth ages 9-14 with a fun, life-changing experience by introducing them to the sport of triathlon. Headquartered in Washington, DC and acting in partnership or collaboration with local governments and private organizations, ACHIEVE takes kids through a 6-week instruction and training program, provided free of charge, insured and monitored by experienced and trained coaches. The ACHIEVE program helps kids master the fundamentals of swimming, cycling, running, and triathlon racing, as well as the essentials of proper nutrition, stretching, strength-training, and flexibility. The ACHIEVE program concludes each season with a timed short-course triathlon race, certified and sanctioned by the USA Triathlon Association (USAT).
Technology plays what role in your daily life?
Do you know what this stands for … LP? A couple of years ago I sent my daughter to school with my Parliament Funkadelic LP (long playing) album as part of her assignment on what is an artifact? She was 12 at the time and it turned out that in a class room of 15-20 middle school children not one of them had actually seen a record album and the school did not have a record player to play this classic. Not to worry, the album is back home safe in my sock drawer waiting until the day I actually get a record player so that I can play it myself.
Today, it is hard for me to remember how we got along without the technology we use. At home, everyone has a laptop computer, mac and windows. I have an iPad (I love my IPAD) There is internet service to the wireless router that supports the ps3 and Xbox 360. Magic Jack for home phone service. We each have cell phones tied to our Google and Apple accounts. Technology dominates our lives in every aspect, almost. I use the calendar evite to schedule all activities, meetings appointments, everything. I do family evites to keep everyone informed about my schedule and theirs. My children are highly competitive swimmers and during swim season (which feels like all year long) my wife and I are constantly on the go transporting one or both children to meets and practice and coaching sessions. And now that Aliza is in high school and moving about the city on her own, I shake my head when I think of how my mother managed when I was in high school.
What software and tool of technology apps has made the biggest difference in your life?
Google, Gmail, calendar, audio, Clio, Reiwise, STDB, Dropbox, LinkedIn,
How do music and culture shape your self-identity?
My wife and I are among the last of the baby-boomers. My birthday is in December and I am really among the last of this generation born in 1964 and growing up on the edge of Generation X. We enjoy the best of both generations. When I hear the music of the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s, it transports me to my youth and a time of great security and protection. The Civil Rights struggle of the 60’s & 70’s created a bubble within the D.C., city limits. I grew up with an acute since of where to go and where not to go. I could travel the city and go anywhere, but never too far. I could travel on H street across North Capital into what was then known as China Town, but not pass 11th street. I could travel along F Street up to Garfinkles at 14th but never over to the White House on 15th. And I only went down on the Mall on the 4th of July.
The bubble created boundaries around blacks in D.C., and between them and whites in other parts of the city. The boundaries kept me safe and allowed me to grow up in an environment where I saw blacks get elected to the school board and become Mayor of the city. The boundaries covered me like a cocoon from which I emerged believing in myself and my ability to accomplish everything I set my mind to achieve.
Define your personal culture.
Second generation Washingtonian, black, middle class with conservative southern liberal values.
Where is your favorite vacation spot?
Anywhere with my lady and children where the beach water is clear and warm. The temperature is 75-80 and occasionally cloudy or even a few warm rain showers.
If you could change one thing about the world what would it be?
It would have affordable housing for everyone. As a real estate professional, I have a front row seat to the devastation on the lives of thousands of persons caused by the lack of access to housing they can afford.
If you could change one thing about yourself what would it be?
The ability to immediately discern what is important to other people. I would know exactly what my residential clients want out of a house — whether the extra bedroom was a deal-breaker or in fact they just want new construction in a different zip code. Or with my commercial clients, whether they want a certain amount of square footage or actually a specific street presence.
